There was no way to reply to the other post on this topic.
On Baby, Let me Shake your Tree, Rahsaan is playing a very specific type of chromatic harmonica, a Polyphonia. This type has the same note on blow or draw, has no slide and has one semitone per hole. In other words hole 1 might play C (both blow and draw), Hole 2 plays C#, Hole 3 plays D, and so on.
Rahsaan also proves to be a pretty good comic singer, not quite blues but pretty close. =========== Winslow
There was no way to reply to the other post on this topic. - Winslow Yerxa Moderators - what's up with that? There's a shorter version of this song - I tried to add it to my post, but every time I clicked on "save" it would revert to the original post.
Berkshire Blues is on a melodica, not a harmonica.
Theme for the Eulipions, however, is definitely chromatic harmonica - played nicely in a Toots-ish balladic mode. (Listening to this I realize that my Girlfriend played me a cut from this album (Return of the 5000 lb Man) not long after we first met.) =========== Winslow
And by the way, completely off-topic, this live performances gives an indication of what a monster Rahsaan was. What it doesn't show is the near-religious intensity of some of his performance, which I experienced live in 1974.
I think I discovered Rahsaan by tracking back from Tull's version of "Serenade to a Cuckoo," which appears on Rahsaan's "I Talk with the Spirits," an all-flute album. He sings through the flute and sometimes alternates licks with vocal comments, which reminded me of how SBWII used to alternate quickly between singing and playing, or how LW used to make comments through his harp mic behind Muddy.
For example, Rahsaan's "The Business Ain't Nothin' But the Blues," also from I Talk with the Spirits:
I saw him 3 times in the early 70`s in philly.and one of his many instruments on one night was a nose flute,with him scat-singing,great !!!But the best was him doing 2 horn harmony following one horn playing great blues.circular breathing too,non stop notes !!!!!!!
